Valuing Assets – and Automobiles – in Bankruptcy

There seems to be a lot of confusion these days about how to put a value on the assets when we list them on a bankruptcy petition. Under the old law it was easier. The value was what you could get for an item if you put it out in the front yard and had to sell it within 24 hours – or at least that was my interpretation of what the law said.

Under the new bankruptcy law the value is what it would cost to replace an item with exactly the same thing, with the same wear and tear and in exactly the same condition. That’s pretty theoretical, since it seems to require that you establish a value by finding the price of an exact duplicate of what you have. When we don’t know what to say for a value, I tell my clients to start looking at Craig’s List or Ebay and see if they can find what they have and at least establish a price range.

One of the most contested areas is the value of cars. It seems that the bankruptcy trustees want to use NADA values, which tend to be aimed at what a dealer should be able to get for a car. If a trustee does use Kelly Blue Book, it’s usually the dealership value. There is nothing in the law, however, that says you have to buy a car from a dealer or use dealership prices. Recently, in the Ramirez case (359 B.R. 794), a bankruptcy judge in Colorado decided that the proper standard for valuing an automobile is the Kelly Blue Book private party value, a number which is always a lot lower than the price that a dealer could get for the same vehicle. I applaud that decision. It seems right to me.

As far as I know, no bankruptcy judge in Minnesota has issued a written decision on the issue. I recently received an email from another attorney, however, stating that two of our judges have stated verbally from the bench that Kelly Blue Book private party value is the one to use.

Most of my clients are good Minnesota people who would rather do anything but come and see somebody like me. They tend to keep trying to figure out how to manage their debt on their own, when they are way past due for a Chapter 7 or Chapter 13 bankruptcy. If you have between fifteen minutes and half an hour, call me (952-544-6356) and at no cost to you I can do a screening over the phone which should give us a fairly good idea of whether you should be filing a bankruptcy and whether it should be a Chapter 7 or a Chapter 13.

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I am a debt relief agency. I help people file for bankruptcy relief under the Bankruptcy Code.

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